David Toop is an English
musician/composer, writer, curator sound, professor and director of culture
audio and improvisation at the London College of Communication.
At the age of 19 years old he
formed his first band of (a sort) free rock alongwith drummer Paul Burwell. He
was a member of the English experimental rock band The Flying Lizards.
He wrote for the British magazine
The Face and is a regular contributor to The Wire. Author of several books,
"Rap Attack: African Jive to New York Hip Hop" (1984), "Ocean of
Sound: Aether Talk, Ambient Sound and Imaginary Worlds" (1995),
"Exotica: Fabricated Soundscapes in a Real World" ( 1999),
"Haunted Weather: Music, Silence, and Memory" (2004) and
"Sinister Resonance: The Mediumship of the Listener" (2010). The
latter published by the editor house Caja Negra of Argentina.Our protagonist is a sound investigator,
interested in the physical ones, high and low sounds and certainly silence which
is in every sound. He’s also an avid explorer of those new sounds that perform
artists around the world and for that reason many collaborative works are taking
place.
Toop has been an active member of
the improvisation and experimental scene in the UK, collaborating with Max
Eastley, Brian Eno, Scanner, among others. He is also member of the improv band
Alterations and curator of sound art exhibitions, among other artistic works.
On this composer and musician can
be appreciated in this interview his particular thoughts about sound and its
transformation into a “natural” object.https://davidtoopblog.com, https://soundcloud.com/david-toop, http://emporium.room40.org

Guillermo Escudero

Julio 2016

On “Making Sounds”
video broadcast on Vimeo you said “that sound is a kind of noise… you could
argue that sound doesn’t actually exist, its always in a state of emerging or
decay…” I should be grateful if you could explain about the sound that is
emerging and the one in decline, that is, which is being developed“This is
really a question about time. Music articulates time in complex ways that human
perception can only understand instinctively, to create that mix of emotional,
physical and intellectual responses that give us the experience of hearing
music deeply. As we hear sound we comprehend the sound that passes into memory
simultaneously with the sound that emerges. In that sense there is no now, only
the oscillation between past and future with an infinitesimal flickering
feeling of the present instant. As a musician you are always conscious of the
‘space’ in which a sound exists, its silence (which may not be a silence), the
shape and weight of a sound and how it passes into the next sound or fades into
nothingness. I think now of that space as a habitat in which sounds move and
grow, coming to life again with each new hearing.”

What is your musical
background?

“I sang in
a church choir when I was a boy, played guitar from the age of 11, learning
some pop songs of the early 1960s, then played in R&B bands, trying to copy
African American artists like Junior Wells, Otis Rush, Muddy Waters and Bo
Diddley. Everything was self-taught. I took up flute when I was about 18, then
met a drummer, Paul Burwell, when I was 19 and we formed a band, playing a sort
of free rock music. After a while we got involved in the free improvisation
scene in London and that was where things got serious. At the same time I was
an art student but I dropped out from a fine art course to follow music. Over
time I added more instruments and diversified into other musical styles but the
improvisation formed the basis of everything I do.”

You have travelled to
many countries meeting local artists and doing concerts. What part of the world
would you like to visit in order to know its music?

“I’d like
to travel more in South America and South-East Asia, work with musicians there.
Recently I was invited to Cambodia – no money, no expenses so I would have had
to pay everything for myself. I was interested to do it
just to find out what’s going on but the date clashed with another commitment.
This summer I’ll be in Mexico, next year I hope to be in Indonesia, maybe
Vietnam. It’s important to collaborate in order to test our own presumptions
and habits, to be aware of how music is changing around the world. In May I was
in Brazil with my friend Rie Nakajima. She and I were running workshops and it
was fascinating to see how people from Porto Alegre responded to our ideas. I’d
be really interested to visit sub-Saharan Africa too. So much to do; so
little time!”

I guess when you
process objects through any electronic device or computer, the sound
possibilities are endless. What criteria prevails for choosing the sound that
interests you?

“I would find it hard to identify the criteria but I know I make
immediate unconscious judgements about each sound that I create. It’s very
quick, like it or don’t like it. The thing is, it’s impossible to know why we
make such decisions. Perhaps there’s a relationship between the food we like to
eat, the friends we make and all the other manifestations of taste that
ultimately govern our lives. I know that a lot of music is boring to me because
I find the sounds to be mediocre. There’s a forensic listening to each sound.
Mostly I begin with an acoustic sound, then transform that over time in the
computer. I know I like very physical sounds, sounds that really feel like
they’re penetrating the skin, getting inside the body, sounds that shock the
system, that you feel you can touch, that really transmit the sensation of
friction, impact, movement, closeness or distance, volatility and differing
materials. I also like very high and very low sounds because they make us more
conscious of the body and our perceptions. I think about silence a lot, too,
how much of a silence component there is in every sound. Sounds you can barely
hear, buried deep in a mix or disappearing – those I love, so position and
proximity in a mix is really important. In a strange way I want every sound to
be a ‘natural’ object, even though I try not to distinguish between nature and
not-nature.”

Could you tell please
tell us about your 'sounding objects' from a range of museums.I saw in the video above mentioned many CD’s and LP’s in your
record collection. What’s the kind of music you like collect and hear at your
place?

“This was
an area of research that grew partly from the difficulties of curating sound
exhibitions. The idea of gallery display is antithetical to sound so there are
always problems. From the beginning of my researches into sound and music, back
in 1971, I was fascinated by musical instruments which had very little physical
presence, were symbolic or conceptual or depended on unstable collaborations,
often human with extra-human. A good example is the recording of a live beetle
jews harp from Papua New Guinea I discovered when I was given access to the BBC
sound archives in the early 1970s. The ‘instrument’ was a live beetle sitting
on a blade of grass and making a droning sound. Mostly they do this by stridulation
– friction of their wings or legs. The human being plays the beetle as an
instrument by holding it close to his mouth, then changing the resonating
cavity of his mouth interior, opening and closing his lips. It’s an instrument
that barely exists, what I would call ‘organology without a body’. This is
something I’m developing, asking the question of whether drawing, for example,
can be an instrument. It’s taking me into some strange but productive areas.”

Your book
"Sinister Resonance" was published in Spanish by Caja Negra, a
publishing house of Buenos Aires. Is it possible that you can come to South
America?

“I hoped to go to Argentina last
year but it never happened. I’ve been to Brazil twice now, lecturing, playing
and giving workshops. Maybe I can visit Chile soon? I hope so.”